The Aged P

Celebs pimping their latest book, film, album, play or tour on TV chat shows….

It’s as inevitable as a starving public sector worker sobbing over Tory “cuts” in a  BBCQT audience – or the presence of some unfunny left wing privately educated “comedian” on HIGNFY.

The reasoning is quite straightforward, of course. It’s a relatively cheap format and certainly not labour intensive. Most of the preparatory planning is driven by publicists, agents and PR drones hustling for a bit of action. The set, once constructed, can be wheeled out time and time again and you can bet your boots that there will be zero tension filled moments. The stage will be swirling with ersatz bonhomie, fixed smiles and false laughter and the celeb will be treated as a veritable genius of comedy or music or whatever.

It’s Polyfilla TV, padding out premium broadcasting space and making life simpler for the schedulers..hence the ubiquitous presence of chat shows on every channel….but especially the BBC.

And it’s the Beeb which must provide us with a particular problem. Over the weeks the celebs tramp though BBC Breakfast, The One Show, Graham Norton and several others all with something to sell. Tickets, books – they are marketing a product, they are ADVERTISING…..

Such a dirty word on the advert free Beeb – yet their publicist or the studio or the record company or the publisher are plumping these celebs in front of the cameras and onto our screens to make money. What’s more, with their appearance fees the celebs are being paid to encourage us to buy more stuff – paid out of the poll tax levy taken out of our pockets and pursed via the TV licence fee.

No wonder they’re all grinning like imbeciles and slapping each other on the back – it’s trebles all round courtesy of the taxpayer.

So here’s a suggestion to balance the scales just a little. From the moment the chat show airs all  payments to the celeb from sales of tickets, records, book etc. should be taxed at, say, 5% and, at the end of the financial year, the total should be re-distributed to TV licence payers as a bonus for putting up with these self-important grinning morons for another year….

Simples…

I am not alone – at least one other person is not particularly impressed by Charlotte Church’s complaints about the media.

During BBC Question Time last night this lady, just an ordinary member of the audience, had the temerity to interrupt Charlotte in full flow

Last night an unnamed audience member aimed a barbed comment at her and said that celebrities who court the press should not be surprised if they are targeted.
‘The man in the street I accept shouldn’t be persecuted, but some celebrities go out for notoriety and press and some of them ask for what they get,’ the woman in yellow said.

Chalotte was shocked SHOCKED that she should be accused of “courting” the press. Twitter was alight with supporters who rushed to the defence of the newest feminist icon. CC waxed angrily about her family to the lady and when she tried to reply David Dimbleby shut her up and moved swiftly on.

Actually I tend to agree with the “unnamed audience member”. Like many celebrities Church has never hesitated to use the media to boost her own career and her public conduct has sometimes been dramatic. I take her point about impact on her family but the very nature of modern celebrity shines a spotlight on the immediate circle and there are always temptations for family and friends to dine out on the link, especially if there is some sort of grievance.

Maybe it’s time to reconfigure this whole concept of “celebrity” for it has taken over our media – look at the TV chat shows and the papers. Editors and producers no longer have to think hard about content – the PR hacks provide them with off the shelf fillers for peanuts…manna from heaven when the bosses are slashing costs. Get rid of the real journalism because that is time consuming and expensive – just get celebrity X on screen or on page to puff their latest film/book/album/show while the host/interviewer pretends to be totally fascinated.

So here’s a suggestion that will kill two birds with one stone – get the intrusive media off celebrity backs and clear my tv screen/paper of meaningless moronic pap at the same time. Just show the singers/actors/players doing what they are supposed to do – AND NO MORE!!!! Get rid of the chat shows and gossip pages, and use the money saved to bring back some good old fashioned journalism…

…and if you don’t have enough material to fill the schedule bring back the potters wheel, a damn sight more interesting than hearing some washed up hasbeen trying to kick start their fading famefest by yattering on about their latest project.

Job done.

Don’t get me wrong – the concept behind the annual Pride of Britain Awards is worthwhile.

The Pride of Britain Awards is an annual event in the United Kingdom, honouring Britons people who have acted bravely or extraordinarily in challenging situations.

Who can fail to be moved by the stories behind the recipients, young and old, as they come up to receive their award. Their actions are a refreshing antidote to the tawdry and shallow world routinely presented to us by the media – the world of “celebrities”. Indeed the Daily Mirror, sponsors of the event, makes a great play on this

In a celebrity-obsessed world, these are the only awards that get it right.
Yes, there is always an impressive array of celebrated names involved.But this is the one awards where they are presenting, not receiving……And it is reassuring to see that even our reverred stars become mere everyday mortals alongside the extraordinary acts of these ordinary people.

But if that’s the case – why the hell are these” celebrities” there at all? Why are they brought on stage, stealing the limelight from the recipients? Why is the camera forever cutting into the audience to focus on the famous faces in the audience?

Here’s a clue

Hosted by Carol Vorderman, our Awards attract an audience of around seven million viewers every year in a primetime slot on the ITV1 network in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland – making it the highest rated awards show of its kind on British television.
It also receives huge coverage on Daybreak, the ITV1 network, the national press, national and regional radio and national magazines.
Many of the biggest names in showbusiness, sport and politics attend the glittering annual ceremony at the London Television Centre

You can hear the agent pointing out those words to the has-been pop singer planning his latest comeback, to the cynical comedian who got into trouble making jokes about “retards”, to the chat show regular recently filmed staggering drunkenly out of some nightclub……make certain you get some exposure on here…and for goodness sake stay sobre and look appropriately serious or tearful when the camera catches you.

Wherever we look on TV there are “celebrities” selling a book, pimping a show/film or pushing an album and the papers are full of their dysfunctional antics. Like showbiz people everywhere they are insanely jealous of anyone else competing in their genre yet, on screen they have to pretend to love each other.

Please, Daily Mirror and ITV, if the POB Awards are supposed to be a counter balance to “our celebrity-obsessed world” then why not produce a programme that focuses entirely on these extraordinary people themselves and GET RID OF THE CELEBRITIES ALTOGETHER!!!!

Interesting story from Guido Fawkes about how last December a journalist tried to get newspapers interested in an article about the BBC pulling the Savile exposure and highlighting some of the issues raised by it

I was told by several of the papers that taste was a factor in their decision but in at least one case the Leveson Inquiry, which was then at its height, was mentioned as being a problem as well. It’s common knowledge that at that time no paper wanted to take on what could turn out to be a controversial story, so they didn’t.”

Remember at the time the odious quartet of Steve Coogan, Max Mosley, Charlotte Church and Hugh Grant were swaggering from studio to studio being celebrated as heroes by fellow showbiz weasels. Who can doubt that in the febrile atmosphere of the moment, if he had been alive and some of his creepy antics reported he would have joined them in their well rehearsed performances of upright citizens hounded by malignant hacks. Indeed Charlotte Church was at it again a few days ago on the ITV chat show hosted by the oily Jonathon Ross, the man who has transformed insincerity into an art form.

Church, who was really there to push her seventh musical comeback, blathered on about being a timid and retiring soul deeply scarred by a vindictive media . But it all sounded a tad self serving in the wake of the Jimmy Savile scandal.

The fact is these showbiz types need the media to keep their names in the public eye. Hence they are circulating constantly using their latest book, film, play, therap, divorce, rape or arrest as a hook to get their faces in the camera lens. Their publicity drones flood the airwaves with their presence to “maintain the profile”. These dysfunctional , self centred parasites need the oxygen of the media to flourish and survive. Hence the hypocrisy of attitude – they want to control medium by exercising a personal veto on all publicity that is not to their liking.

The Savile /BBC scandal is a timely reminder that the media must not be hamstrung by legislation which restricts their ability to tell us something about the darker side of these glittering stars….